I still say, screw LA proper. Visit Santa Monica, see the down-ramp to Hwy 1, Rockford Files scenes; visit San Clemente, weather's great, cool breezes and great restaurant on its pier, yeah it's OC but much better.

--sorry i can't do all the cool spanish accents, tildes, exclamation points or question marksupside down or otherwise--

i learned spanish at the bodega up the streetand also from jose who came in on a load of organic bananas from equadorgreat cockroach that jose but he's being exploited if you ask meanyway i have to be careful not to mix up all the languages i knowbecause my poor 960 brain cells get all crossed upand i start thinking german grammar with spanish words, etcthrow some french in and i sound like i walked off the set of the grand illusioni'm a multicultural cockroach, you know

anyway, if you want to get into the local spirityou can learn to pronounce the full name of where you are in spanish about like this--

la see-you-thad theh nooestra senyora la rayeena theh los anhelays

that's a rough idea emphasis rough

me being multicultural and alli'll be glad to help with translations, etcbut you've got to post some of those great pixof you eating in restaurants, etcespecially if they're mexicani luv mexican foodtengo un poco de hambre ahoraplease post pix so i can live vicariouslyon the floor next to you

"OH! Ann, you're in the perfect place to watch "The Dark Knight" if you haven't already. It is very very good."

In fact, we did go see The Dark Knight, but I thought it was terrible! Long, repetitive, endless shooting and punching. It left me stone cold. I don't even understand why other people like it. I've seen all the Batman movies by the way. It was nowhere near as good as Batman Begins. I mean, it was a complete chaotic mess. And having the Joker explain that he's all about chaos is not good enough. It was dull video-game-style violence that made absolutely no impact on me.

We saw it at The Grove.

"And yes, Batman is GW Bush."

I agree with that. The use of extreme interrogation methods and the surveillance techniques ... seemed pretty clearly intended to evoke the Bush administration.... except that I don't expect Hollywood to be that pro-Bush... but it is.

... seemed pretty clearly intended to evoke the Bush administration.... except that I don't expect Hollywood to be that pro-Bush... but it is.

If only we were fighting cartoon cads who announce their plans in full clown makeup -- but that's a fantasy. Hollywood never stints from the full-blown fantasy of heroes/anti-heroes who cross all the lines--it's a safe catharsis. Isn't that why Plato was so suspect of drama?

Frank Miller's Dark Knight is unhinged, but he still knows he's on thin moral ground. He's also aware he should be held accountable when he employs his invasive surveillance plan - again, that's a fantasy and nothing like this administration.

DBQ - if the Crisco shortage gets bad, let me know and I'll ship you some trans fat. I can't stand by idly while others go without fried chicken.

Let us all take note - Democrats and Republicans alike, once they reach a position to be able to do so, have no problem telling the rest of us how to live. The "nanny state" is not the property of one party nor philosophy. It's about having power.

I agree with that. The use of extreme interrogation methods and the surveillance techniques ... seemed pretty clearly intended to evoke the Bush administration.... except that I don't expect Hollywood to be that pro-Bush... but it is.

I decided I'm too lazy to get off that Summer Film Guide right now, so just a few words on this thought.

There ARE some problems with the Batman = Bush analogy, but even movies cannot have a perfect simile or else it's too obvious.

However, it was immediately apparent when watching it that Heath Ledger's Joker was a terrorist.

In fact, my contention is that he stands for the TERROR terrorists create, itself, rather than being a terrorist. He is amorphous, untrackable, doesn't seem to live anywhere he just IS OUT THERE somewhere.

Michael Caine's butler-philosopher said it best that some men do not kill for any purpose, they just want to see the world burn.

I agree that Al-Qaeda have specific plans for the world, based on a worldview tied to their (idea of their own) religion, whereas the Joker is a psychopath who wants to create anarchy. He's more like a Maoist terrorist, but even the Shining Path have institutional aims, so Ledger is anarchic-terror incarnate. It has no aim but to create chaos.

Nevertheless, you can see that the Joker is a charismatic loner with a plan to groom others to take his place (I won't spoil this plot device, but you know who I mean).

Ironically, so does Batman, and with the same person -- a wonderful plot twist which I think makes this film much deeper than you think it is on first viewing it.

Batman is a night-time vigilante hero that has come to be hated by the greater populace, but continues to do what he does because someone has to do it. No one wants to be unpopular, everyone wants to be the hero, everyone wants to be loved or re-elected. But he doesn't care. He has a purpose and he won't be deviated from it.

In the daytime, he's a goofball airhead rich man, in charge of a corporation he doesn't even really run. He's a joke. No one takes him seriously.

But he's got a good right-hand man, who ultimately makes a decision based on his opposition to espionage on its citizens, even if it means this will catch the bad guy(s).

Well, I could go on for hours. Just the title alone (The Dark Knight) has a treble meaning, if not more.

British director, Christopher Nolan, had a daunting task after Batman Begins.

But whereas the first film (spectacular) was vastly entertaining, I think The Dark Knight transcends the genre.

I'd heard that the fight scenes were muddled, too. So I was surprised at how easy they were (for me) to parse. I thought they were even a little...staid. (I think that was part of the movie's "realism", though: There weren't a lot of gymnastics in the fights, just a few kicks and right crosses.)

I do think there's a real divide between how many frames it takes for younger people to parse out images versus older ones.

Beth--Watchmen (which I am completely unfamiliar with other than hearing the title over the years) is being done by Zack Snyder of 300 and Dawn of the Dead. He's got a pretty sure hand.

On the other hand, what else of Moore's has been made into a movie? The dopey-as-it-sounds League of Extraordinary Gentlemen? The terrorist loving V for Vendetta?

From Hell is Moore's, but the film has almost nothing to do with the book, other than the broad topic of Jack the Ripper. It was a terrible adaptation.

It's not a terrible movie, though. Not great. But Depp is quite good; he was in Sleepy Hollow around the same time, playing an entirely different English detective character.

League on the other hand, is only barely watchable. I assumed the comic book was much, much better. Er, graphic novel, I mean. It was such a dangerous concept, I had to believe that the source material manage to evolve the pitfalls the book wallowed in.